Professor Jason Glynos from the Department of Government is the lead academic on the project. He said: “It is hard not to be excited by this imaginative and bold experimental initiative.

“Research staff in the Faculty of Social Sciences have long produced work that is widely acknowledged to be world-leading, generating new perspectives that help us better understand social, economic, and political issues linked to sexuality, race, migration and refugees, inequality and poverty, technology, ideology, and so on.

“These perspectives often open up new ways to imagine, analyse, and tackle things differently.

“To bring an artist’s sensibility and creativity into contact with this work provides a unique opportunity to explore, in a distinctive way, the contribution Essex research makes to speculative and critical thinking.”

Alicja’s practice is interdisciplinary and encompasses research and production with a focus on social structures and the political subtext of daily life.

She has been widely exhibited and participated in residencies internationally, including Paradise Air in Matsudo/Tokyo, MuseumsQuartier in Vienna, IASPIS in Stockholm, MeetFactory in Prague, National University of Colombia in Bogota and TATE Britain in London.

She attended the Home Workspace programme at Ashkal Alwan in Beirut and has received grants from Arts Council England, Instytut Adama Mickiewicza and the European Cultural Foundation, in addition to artist bursaries from Artsadmin and a-n.

Speaking about the residency, Alicja said: “This is a truly fantastic and unique opportunity for me as an artist whose work and research engages with social and political issues and draws a lot on social sciences and my background in cultural studies.

“I’m hoping to specifically address what ideas for alternative, desirable futures are being discussed and researched at the moment, especially given the current crisis of political imaginary in wider society.”